Ch 4: Social Cognition: Thinking about People and Situations​

Preview: How do we judge our social worlds, consciously ​ and unconsciously? ​ How do we perceive our social worlds? ​ How do we explain our social worlds? ​ How do our social beliefs matter? ​ What can we conclude about social beliefs and judgments?​

Social Judgement examines…

how people make decisions, interpret past events, understand current events, and make predictions for future events.​

Social Judgments influence our

behavior

Social judgements are often inaccurate. Why?

They are prone to error and bias

Intuitive Judgement

People judge, or make a decision, based on their intuitions or subjective feelings.

What is “Processing”?

Storing information where it is relevant and making it meaningful

What are two types of processing?

Automatic Processing

Controlled Processing

Automatic Processing (System/Level 1)

fast, automatic, and unconscious thought processes that occur “implicitly”

• corresponds with intuition

• 1

Controlled Processing (System/Level 2)

slow, effortful, and conscious thought processes that occur “explicitly”

• corresponds with reflection

• 2

Automatic Processing is related to 4 things:

1. schemas

2. emotional reactions

3. snap judgements

4. expertise​

What are two limitations of intuition?

Intuitions are…

• error-prone hindsight judgements

• capacity for illusion

They demonstrate the brain's inherent biases that lead to flawed conclusions, making our intuitive understanding of reality unreliable and often inaccurate

error-prone hindsight judgement

The tendency to believe an event was more predictable after it occurred shows that our intuition is distorted because we aren't truly able to remember how we felt before the event; instead, our memories are reconstructed to fit the outcome. This leads us to believe our intuitive judgments were more accurate than they were. 

capacity for illusion

Refers to our brain's tendency to perceive patterns where none exist, create fantasies, or form beliefs that are not rooted in reality. 

• Illusions highlight that our sensory perception and our interpretation of information are subjective and can be easily fooled. When our minds create "constructed beliefs" or fantasies, it demonstrates that our intuition isn't always based on objective truth, but on what feels right or what we want to believe. 

T or F: Although people create false beliefs, not all beliefs are false

TRUE

• To recognize falsification, it helps to know how it is done​

Priming

the activation, often unconsciously, of certain associations, thus predisposing one's perception, memory, or response.

• preparing us to respond a certain way

how does priming play a role in Social Psychology?

• Can influence another thought or even an action​

• Things we don’t even consciously notice can subtly influence how we interpret and recall events​

• Illustrates the concept that much of our social information processing is automatic​

Embodied cognition

a theoretical framework in psychology that emphasizes the role of the body in cognitive processes. It proposes that our bodies and our interactions with the world shape and influence our thoughts, feelings, and actions.

How does embodied cognition play a role is Social Psychology?

Brain systems that process our bodily sensations communicate with the brain systems responsible for our social thinking​

Overconfidence Phenomenon

the tendency to be more confident than correct—to overestimate the accuracy of one’s beliefs​

What two things feed overconfidence?

1. admiration of confidence in others

2. incompetence

How does incompetence in others feed overconfidence?

• Ignorance of one’s incompetence occurs mostly on relatively easy-seeming tasks​

Confirmation Bias

a tendency to search for information that confirms one’s preconceptions.

• We are eager to verify our beliefs but less inclined to seek evidence that might disprove them​​

How does confirmation bias play a role in Social Psychology?

• People often choose news sources and friends that align with their beliefs, leading to “ideological echo chambers”​

• Confirmation bias appears to be a System 1 snap judgment​

• Stability of our self-images may be explained in part by confirmation bias​

What can you do to diminish overconfidence?

1. Be wary of other people’s dogmatic statements​

2. Avoid undermining people’s reasonable self-confidenceand decisiveness; this can lead to shrinking fromspeaking up or making tough decisions​

3. Obtain prompt feedback

4. Think of at least one good reason a judgment might be wrong​

Heuristic

Heuristics are efficient thinking strategies that enable swift, efficient judgments

(Is it really efficient if it does not always guarantee a correct answer, since they rely on mental shortcuts and rules of thumb that are prone to cognitive biases and errors)

what are the two types of Heuristics?

1. Representativeness Heuristic

2. Availability Heuristic

Representativeness Heuristic

Judging things according to how well they represent a prototype​

• helpful for quick decisions

How is the Representativeness Heuristic problematic?

it does not consider the actual probability of the event occurring

• ignores the actual statistical “base rate” information to judge likelihood

• Diabetes

• People die: Leukemia, Drowning, Guns in the home

• 13% of crimes are violent in the U.S.

Availability Heuristic

People judge the likelihood of an event based on how easily they can recall examples of it

• How available they can recall an instance in their mind

How does the Availability Heuristic problematic?

It leads to biased assessments of risk

• When negative information is over-reported in the news— how does this lead to error?​

Representative and Availability Heuristics chart:

Counterfactual thinking

the psychological process of imagining alternative outcomes to past events

• Imagining worse alternatives helps us feel better​

• imagining better alternatives makes us feel worse

• Imagining “what could have been” happens when we can easily picture an alternative outcome​

• The more significant/unlikely the event, the more intense the counterfactual thinking

illusory correlation

cognitive bias where we perceive a relationship between two things that are not actually correlated

• People use random events to confirm ​their beliefs​

• ex: Gamblers attribute wins to their skill and foresight; losses are “near misses,” “flukes,” or a bad call by a referee​

• Regression towards the average

Regression toward the Average

The statistical tendency for extreme scores or extreme behavior to return toward their average.

• In human behavior: people tend to regress back to average behavior

How do moods (unhappy and happy) affect judgement?

Our mood affects our perceptions, further influencing our judgement

How does mood influence judgment among Happy people?

Happy people:

• more tusting, loving, and responsive

• the world seems friendlier

• less indecisive

• good news more readily comes to mind​

How does mood influence judgment among Unhappy people?

Unhappy people:

• more focused

• ruminate

• motivates intense thinking

• primes recollection of negative events

We respond to reality as we construe it, not as it is.  Why?

Because our preconceptions guide how we perceive and interpret information​

Belief Perseverance

people to hold onto their initial beliefs even when confronted with new information that contradicts or disconfirms them

• The more we search for evidence that supports our belief, the less receptive we become to evidence that challenges it.

What does belief perseverance play a role in?

Fake News

Misinformation effect

Misleading information can alter memories​ after the event occurs

• This process affects our recall of social as well as physical events​

Memory construction

enables us to revise our own histories of past behavior (we underreport bad behavior and overreport good behavior)

As relationships change, we also revise our recollections with/of other people

Used to give an explanation for “WHY” when pressured to give an answer/reason for why we’re on the lower end of the spectrum in society

“Rosy retrospection”

Rosy Retrospection

cognitive bias where people recall past events with greater fondness and positivity than they experienced them at the time, effectively looking at the past through "rose-colored glasses"

Our judgments of people depend on…

how we explain people’s behavior​

• Attribution theory helps us make sense of how such explanations work​

Misattribution

misattributing a behavior to the wrong source

Attribution Theory

the theory of how people explain others’ behavior (by attributing it)

• Dispositional Attribution

• Situational Attribution

Dispositional Attribution

Attributing a person’s behavior to their dispositions (qualities/traits)

Situational Attribution

Attributing a person’s behavior to the situation (environment/external factors)

Spontaneous trait inference

infer a person's personality trait from their behavior, without conscious effort or additional information

• automatic and unconscious

• opposite of dispositional

Fundamental attribution error

tendency to underestimate the influence of circumstances (situational factors) when explaining their behavior and overestimate a person's character (dispositional factors) when explaining their behavior

• ex: assuming a driver who cuts you off is a "jerk," while not considering that they might be rushing to the hospital

Why do we make the fundamental attribution error?

• The Actor-Observer Difference

• We observe others from a different perspective than we observe ourselves​

  • ex: camera perspective bias​

• When recalling the past, we are like observers of someone else​

• We also find causes where we look for them​

• Cultural influences

  • Individualistic Western view predisposes people to assume that people, not situations, cause events​

Culture and the Fundamental Attribution Error: Western Individualistic

The Individualistic Western View assumes that people, not situations, cause events​

• in the context of personal goals, attributes, and preferences

  • pay less attention to context than others

Why study the Fundamental Attribution Error?

1. To reveal how we think about ourselves and others​

2. To illuminate how environmental causes are often the root of people’s failures, disabilities, and misfortune​

3. We are mostly unaware of our biases and can benefit from greater awareness​

Self-fulfilling prophecy

a belief that manifests into its own fulfillment

• Occur in workplaces, courts, police contexts, and family interactions

• Types:

  • Experimenter Bias

  • Behavioral Confirmation

Experimenter Bias (in self-fulfilling prophecy)

research participants sometimes live up towhat they believe experimenters expect of them​

Teacher Expectations and Student Performance​

• Teachers’ expectations shape and predict performance

• High expectations boost low achievers

• Students notice teachers’ nonverbal cues

• Students’ own expectations also affect outcomes

Relates to self-fulfilling prophecy: students will fulfill others’ expectations of them

People often get what they expect— what’s Behavioral Confirmation?

Behave in ways that will cause a reaction that confirms their preconceived notion of them

A person's social expectations about another individual cause them to behave in ways that lead the target to act in a manner consistent with those expectations, thus confirming the original belief

• a sequence where a perceiver's beliefs influence their treatment of a target, the target adjusts their behavior to the treatment, and the perceiver interprets this behavior as proof of their initial belief. 

What Can We Conclude about Social Beliefs and Judgments?​

Social cognition studies reveal that our information-processing powers are efficient and adaptive, but people do sometimes form false beliefs​

• Trying hard doesn’t eliminate thinking biases​

• Our intuition is vulnerable to misjudgment​

• If anything, laboratory procedures overestimate our intuitive powers​

• False impressions, interpretations, and beliefs can produce serious consequences​

• Heuristic snap judgments, however, enable efficient thinking and can aid in our survival